eSports: Professional Video Gaming

Video games have been around for many years and so has competitive gaming. The first video game was created around 1970 and was Pong. Pong required one or two players to play. The players would play next to each other and the game required both players to move the courser to the ball and knock in to the other player’s side. Pong was the first competitive video game because you could play with another person. The video game industry now is a very big market and is suspected to be an 86 billion dollar industry in 2016 (A Classification Of Business Models In Video Game Industry). For the past couple of years video competitions have gotten really popular and now there is a franchise called eSports that hosts gaming competitions in big areas. “The past several year’s eSports have seen meteoric growth in dozens of markets, attracting tens of millions of viewers each year in the United States, alone” (Hollist). Esports is made up of many different games and each game has different teams that specialize in the game that they are competing in. E-Sports 89 million viewers in 2014 and is suspected to grow to 145 million in 2017. ("Red Bull Media Readies ESports Studio for Prime Time."). Competitive gaming should be recognized as a sport because each team has a sponsor. The sponsors pay for all associated costs of the player’s gaming including, but not limited to, plane tickets, hotel rooms, and food. In return the teams have to wear the

Football, baseball, basketball, and other similar sports offer athletic scholarships to students with distinct skills or talents. These students are awarded money because they exhibit the ability to compete at the collegiate level. Furthermore, those fortunate enough to make it to the big leagues are offered sponsorships and contracts for millions of dollars. Video gamers receive the same benefits. Colleges are offering athletic scholarships to skilled gamers who play e-sports (Krings, 2016). Like professional athletes, contracts and sponsorships are negotiated in the world of e-sports. Although, in comparison, video game players do not receive the same monetary compensation as athletes in more prominent sports. They do, nonetheless, receive scholarships, sponsorships, and contracts making them worthy of the athlete

Many people argue that competitive sports raise numerous amounts of pressure on the youth making them distracted from things such as their education and because it can cause severe injuries, but some people argue that youth should play competitive sports because it teaches major life lessons that can help with many different aspects of their future such as college, getting a job, and many more. Playing competitive sports also improves your physical strength, another physical aspect of playing competitive sports is decreasing your chance of being obese or having disease. If you don't prefer to play competitive sports there are alternative options such as biking or walking to school. In an HT Health article “Sports Seen As Key Weapon in Fighting Teen Obesity” it says that in a study with 1,700 kids, ten percent walked or biked to school 3 ½ days a week,, in the study they found that biking or walking to school lowered the risk of being obese by 33%. I argue that kids should play competitive sports because of the important life skills taught through these sports and the physical benefit of playing sports. In this paper I will explain how communication, time management, and lowering the risk of being obese; supports my claim, “Kids should play competitive sports”

Esports is a controversial topic when it comes to professional gamers, especially in western states. Many people believe that people who play video games are not athletes. However, Some argue that being a professional gamer takes the same amount of hard work as any other sport. I agree, professional gamers take video games to a whole new level and only a small

An issue that is hotly debated is, should kids play competitive sports or not. It’s clear that the overall people feel that competitive sports are good for kids. Competitive sports teaches kids life lessons, makes them more responsible and teaches them healthy habits. Millions of American children and teenagers are overweight. This obesity epidemic has made the early onset of health problems such as diabetes, are more common. Over forty millions of boys and girls were participating in organized competitive sports in 2008, and this will help bring down the obesity rate.

Though there have been so many factors to determine the success of a game especially in sports, there are only few that provide real life experience. With the growing gaming market and the increased number of gamers who are aware of the world market in games and sports, the requirements to keep up a competitive game system is essential to the business of gaming (Ruggill & McAllister, 2011).

Last year the League of Legends finals alone brought 40,000 people to Seoul, South Korea.(xx Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Paragraph 5) This isn’t counting the thousands at home who watched using streaming services. The teams also attract sponsors. The company DXRacer USA gave Robert Morris University a free chair which normally costs 349 dollars. Finally, eSports are one of the fastest growing sports ever. The quote, “The eSports scholarship program has been featured by ESPN, NPR, HBO’s ``Real Sports`` and a variety of other newsgroups.”, shows this. (xx Pittsburg Post and Gazette Paragraph 3) The only other sports to get this much attention to get this level of attention at the college level are men's basketball and men's football. Video games are fast on the rise in the world as the world moves toward a more technology dependent society. Estimates put video game spectators at 19.4 million by 2020.

Studies show that children need at least an hour of physical activity a day, and with athletics they can easily achieve this. Exercising regularly leads to a healthy weight and body mass and has been shown to improve memory retention, result in better moods, less stress, and even increase focus and concentration levels(Aiu In Online Learning). Teens who are involved in sports are less likely to spend time playing video games, watching TV, and other electronics and more time being active (10 reasons). Studies show that students who aren’t involved in extracurricular activities are 49% more likely to use drugs, and 37% more apparent to becoming teen parents, and students who take part in sports are less likely to participate in unsafe and risky activities, leading to a healthier lifestyle. Children’s health would be at a risk if schools all across America were to start cutting sports

Whether it’s playing video games or watching video games, we get filled with an intoxicating feeling to play or watch more. Throughout generations, there has been an increase of people playing video games and about half the population in the United States plays video games. Since 1980, video games are taken to a different level with eSports, which is competitive electronic gaming tournaments with other competitors. In 2000 to the present , eSports grew in popularity and became known worldwide because of the game “League of Legends”. In 2011 “LoL” tournament ranked over 1.6 million views worldwide and during a “LoL” championship in 2015 over 36 million people were viewing the game. ESport raises this question: “Do video games counts as sports?” Video games do not count as a sport because it does not match the criteria of a sport,video games are luck-based, and are unhealthy.

Video games are “a waste of time” they don 't actually improve anything, they are just entertainment. However there is drastic evidence to show that couldn’t be further from the truth. They actually have a huge mental benefit that can enhance memory, better hand to eye coordination and enhanced reflexes along with other things aswell. Showing that they are indeed not just a time killer and waster but are hugely benefiting the minds of the people that play them. The first point I would like to bring up is enhanced memory, a study suggests that young children can benefit from the memory aspects of video games. Several children had multiple sessions of several video games with increases challenge and it had been noted that they did show signs of progress in the difficulty but more importantly an increase in a strong memory showing that the two indeed have a connection. Secondly hand to eye coordination, another study was conducted and yet again the gamer who repeatedly played games was faster, sharper and overall better than the non-gamer. The other main point is reflexes which sort of ties in with the other points but deserves another mention, research indicates that fast-paced gameplay along the lines of Call of Duty and other various games, does in fact increase reflexes.

The first reason eSports should be considered a sport is because of the training required to make it big. Professional gaming teams spend over half of their day practicing, going over tactics, looking over their replays, and discussing with their teammates. In passage 3 paragraph 20, professional StarCraft player Greg said "you play 10 to 12 hours a day, with maybe one day off a month. " The amount of effort and determination required is similar to the extraneous training required by other sports like football. He also gave an example of how their day looks and

Competitive gaming, also known as e-sports, is becoming a worldwide phenomenon. With huge events and tournaments that are watched by millions of passionate fans, many people are beginning to question whether playing video games can be considered a real sport. Even though e-sports may not be as physically demanding as traditional sports like football and basketball, the structure, strong fan base and the requirements to seriously contend in the competitive gaming scene legitimize it as a “real” sport.

Beside the mental effects of gaming, lay the physical effects. Another belief of gaming is that it is physically threatening, and if not taken in moderation, that may be true, but at face value, some video games can be a very useful tool for physical fitness. “Serious” games, as mentioned previously, are games that are designed for personal improvement, but as stated by Mark Baxter, “serious” games are just a subgenre of a more encompassing genre known as lifestyle games. According to Baxter, these games lack the more academic focus typically associated with “serious” games, yet still focus primarily on improvement through tier one gaming experiences. An example he gives of a successful lifestyle game is Wii Fit, which is a game that consists of exercise activities. He also claims that games like these have been adopted in several physiotherapy rehabilitation centers (Brain Health and Online Gaming). Baxter is right on this claim. These lifestyle games, also known as fitness games, contain a variety of physical benefits, including rehabilitation, and thankfully, several console designers are attempting to embrace these positives. In 2006, Nintendo released the Wii console, which is the console Baxter’s example was played on. It saw large commercial success due to its ability to provide gamers with an entertaining and physically stimulating experience, selling over one-hundred million units worldwide. This console allowed players to exercise in a unique way that entertaining,

eSports are a form of a sport that deals with video games and their competitions between professionals. eSports has risen over the years, with 2016 allowing the peak of the popularity. “Consider this year’s The International 2016 DOTA (Defense Of The Ancients) 2 Tournament,” Chris Wood says to The State Press [eSports deserve their place in the world]. “The total prize pool available to the winning teams of this tournament (August, 2016) was around $20 million dollars. In comparison, the prize money pool for the 2014 Rose Bowl was $22 million.” With winnings like this, I believe it is beyond safe to say that eSports are on the rise, and they mean business.

Gaming has been such a huge part of nearly everyone’s life growing up as a kid and it’s only getting bigger and bigger every day. Growing up as a kid, online gaming wasn’t as popular as it is today. I started off with a Gameboy and Dreamcast console that later shifted to better consoles like the PlayStation, Xbox, Wii, and Nintendo. Nowadays, almost everyone, including myself, have shifted to the more popular gaming platforms in mobile games and online PC games. More specifically, certain types of online gaming styles like FPS, MOBA, and MMO are distinctly more popular than many others. Not only has the popularity for online gaming platforms evolved but the importance and relevance of